Sunday, May 5
EL SANTO Double Feature
SANTO VS. EVIL BRAIN
and SANTO VS. INFERNAL MEN
at Planet Ant • 2320 Caniff St, Hamtramck, MI 48212
Doors 5:00 p.m. | Film at 5:30 p.m.
Presented with Cinema Lamont
Immediately recognizable by his distinctive silver mask, the heroic wrestler Santo (‘The Saint’) was Mexico’s most popular luchador, becoming a folk hero and the star of a hugely popular series of action films. Our show is the Detroit première of beautiful new 4K restorations of the first two films in the Santo series.
In 1961’s SANTO VS. EVIL BRAIN (Santo contra cerebro del mal), the dastardly Doctor Campos kidnaps and brainwashes scientists. When undercover detective Santo falls prey to Campos’ scheme, Lieutenant Zambrano (Enrique Zambrano) and El Incognito (Fernando Osés, who wrote the script) must come to his assistance to foil Campos’ plans.
Meanwhile, in the same year’s SANTO VS. INFERNAL MEN (Santo contra hombres infernales), the trio of Santo, El Incognito, and Zambrano team up once again to fight a band of drug smugglers.
EVIL BRAIN and INFERNAL MEN were filmed in Cuba as Castro’s revolutionaries entered Havana. The filmmakers — Mexican genre masters Joselito Rodriguez, Jorge Garcia-Besné, and Enrique J. Zambrano — were forced to flee with the unprocessed 35mm negative smuggled inside a coffin. The celluloid birth of a true screen legend may have been difficult, but it led to 50 additional Santo films.
Mexico/Cuba. 1961. Restoration by Permanencia Voluntaria with support from Nicholas Winding Refn and the Academy Film Archive.
In Spanish with English subtitles.
Written and directed by Joselito Rodríguez.
Total running time: 150 min. plus 10 minute intermission.
SANTO VS. EVIL BRAIN 73 min. | SANTO VS. INFERNAL MEN 77 min.